What did I see?
by Elfgirl96
Summary: Kit and Jerome reflect on Olaf and Esme. Two-shot. I don't own ASOUE


**A/N: I've read up to **_**The End**_** but haven't read **_**The Beatrice Letters, **_**so please forgive any inconsistencies with the actual books. Also, this isn't written in the Lemony Snicket style, which is intentional - I don't think I could pull of his style, so I just wrote it in my own. Enjoy and let me know what you think.**

* * *

><p>What had he imagined? A peaceful, quiet life on Dark Avenue with the Baudelaire orphans? He had gotten anything but that. He'd tolerated Esme's obsession with things that were 'in', he hadn't argued, he'd done everything in search of that life, but it was gone - or maybe it wasn't. Maybe it hadn't slipped through his fingers, but had been something that he had never even held. They were technically still married, and yet she was gallavanting around with Count Olaf and a harpoon gun, he in his ridiculous disguises and her in her fashionable clothes.<p>

The worst part was that he didn't know why. It was the only question he couldn't put aside, the only one that remained at the front of his mind, reverberating in his brain and slamming against his skull. _Why? Why? Why?_ He'd tried so hard to give her everything she wanted, hadn't said a word when their decor changed almost weekly, hadn't protested when their routine was overturned each time a new habit was deemed 'in.' Olaf might not have been discouraging Esme's outrageous way of life, but where he had been passive, Olaf was confrontational; where he had been polite and quiet, Olaf was snarky and aggressive. She couldn't be happy. She couldn't be happy with a man like that.

Did she truly feel something for him, then, or was she just another one of her accessories, a showpiece on her arm? There couldn't be more to it than that, because she couldn't feel any emotional attachment to _him. _He was selfish and harsh, with a superior attitude and a sinister mien.

What did she see in him?

But she was the same way, he realized as he wearily climbed the stairs to his apartment. She was selfish and superior and unfeeling. So perhaps the question that Jerome Squalor really needed to be asking himself, was what had he ever seen in her?

* * *

><p>She wasn't his type. It was the first thought that came to her mind, jumped into her thoughts from those deep emotions buried in her heart. The woman who wore flamboyant dresses in the colors of flames and skimpy bikinis made out of lettuce was definitely <em>not<em> his type. But then the thought was gone, and she was as unable to protest its departure as she had been its arrival. Because after everything that had happened, after all that had changed, what did she know about Olaf's type?

But still. What would _anyone_ want with Esme Squalor? Her attention span was fleeting, her sympathy non-existant. She was self-obsessed and shallow, and posessed no obvious skills or attributes that would make her a valuable ally. She was determined and good at getting what she wanted, but that was just the thing - it was always what _she_ wanted. Where was the appreciation for others, the intellect and the spunk? Hadn't Olaf once said it was those qualities he valued the most? So how could he so easily overlook their absence now?

Yet the appearance of Carmelita Spats alone was enough to show that Esme had him quite thoroughly wrapped around her finger. But _how_? Did he truly feel something for her, or was she just something pretty to hover at his side, someone to fire the harpoon gun and keep the bed warm at night? It couldn't be more than that, because you couldn't feel anything for a person like _her._ She was so uncaring. She had minimal emotions of her own, and how could you love someone who was unable to return the emotion?

What did he see in her?

But he had become the same way, she realized. The changes in him were so overwhelming, and now it was him that was shallow and superior and unfeeling. So perhaps the question that Kit Snicket really needed to be asking herself, was what had she ever seen in him?


End file.
